U.S. Classic Champs model event at Prince William Forest Park. The terrain was green, with lots of greenbriar, holly and laurel, which greatly reduced the visibility and runnability. I also navigated poorly, not keeping good map contact, not visualizing the terrain well, and not planning ahead. I resolved to do better a little later at the sprint model event.

U.S. Champs sprint model event. I orienteered better than I had in the classic model but still not well. I sprained my left ankle badly enough that I had to walk for 20-30 seconds, but I was able to resume jogging after that, and the pain went away within several minutes after that. My new O-shoes were stiff and uncomfortable, and they hurt the protuberance of my right heel significantly.

U.S. Sprint Champs. I had a good run, with one true miss (~10 sec.) and only a few other small bobbles and hesitations. It didn't have the squeaky-clean feeling of a great run while I was doing it, but my legs felt strong in the forest, and it was good enough for the win.

I forgot to clear and check my SI card at the start, so I ran back and did that, and started only 20 seconds ahead of Lachezar Iliev, who came within a second or two of catching me on the short legs early in the course (around #8 was closest, I think). From the start and for the first third of my race, I thought about how screwed up it was that this happened and how it might unfairly help me if he overtook me, and I hoped I would be able to run fast enough to keep him behind me. Fortunately, I was able to stay in front of him at all times and--with the exception of my 10 second miss on control 6, which I corrected without breaking stride--I didn't make mistakes because of the pressure. I gapped him on the long leg from 9 to 10 and wasn't aware of him behind me after that.

After the race, my right heel was quite inflamed from the new shoe. I taped my left ankle, and it neither turned again nor was painful at all during or after the race--whew!

Ran around the roads and regional paths near BWI airport: route. I felt pretty good, although my legs felt fatigued up the hills in the second half of the run. Midway through the run, I stepped in a hole running on some grass, and I nearly sprained my ankle.

At night, from the bottom of Interlaken Park, I ran the BEAST #3 orienteering course from this year, with an additional side trip or two and a few minutes out and back to the Park from the car. I also did 4 x 45 seconds hard surges during the run. I didn't do the hard runs at a regular interval, but I always had at least 1:30 jogging recovery in between.

Ran to Meadowbrook, ran the O course from a training event I organized some time ago (logged separately), then ran back home. I felt pretty good for most of the run, aside from the usual left hamstring pains.

Outrigger canoe practice with the Seattle Outrigger Canoe Club. Murray coordinated a MerGeo team training, and Kimberly, Peteris and I joined him in a boat. We went out for 2 hours, but we took some breaks to rest and receive coaching from our excellent mentor, John. He gave us many helpful tips on how to paddle properly and had us do a bunch of intervals.

After doing no paddling (of any kind) for months, I was apprehensive about this outing, but I survived it okay, probably better than I would have a 2-hour kayak paddle, in fact. I think I'm going to be sore tomorrow!

Ran the Vampire-O at Lynndale Park with Kimberly Shavender and Anna Urbanova. It was fun, as usual, but my team didn't do very well, also as usual, getting vamped twice when we had a bunch of punches and maybe a couple more times for good measure. The logged distance and control count are guesses. I can verify them when I have the map in front of me.

A little after 11 p.m., I ran from home to the NH track for a baby threshold workout. I was thinking 3 x 1 mile, but I decided 4 x 1 km would be better. Then when I got to the track and had lethargic legs, even after warming up, I decided to cut it down further and just do 6 laps. Warmed up, did some form drills, and warmed down home.

2400m threshold run. Out of curiousity, I counted paces after the first lap, and I did 639 for 2000m (in 7:14), which comes out to 88 per minute--about right for this intensity, I guess. I felt fine but not great doing this workout.